El Género en la Lucha Política en Judith Butler

Abstract

The aim of the present work is to show, through Judith Butler's proposal of performativity, how the category of gender and all the implications of the political struggle of feminism during the mid-twentieth century are being problematized. Hence, the focus is on three specific themes: language, feminism and politics. Now, it is worth clarifying that, for the present research only two texts of the American philosopher are used, since she has an extensive work, which are: Gender in Dispute and Allied Bodies and Political Struggle: Towards a Performative Theory of Assembly. As for the first one, it had a great worldwide recognition, and it is in which the concept of gender performativity is presented for the first time. And, in the second, Butler returns to the notion of performativity with the movement of the squares, likewise, it is an attempt to dispute the meaning of the word responsibility.

The first chapter consists of two sections: “Performativity in Judith Butler”, explores the category of performativity from her text Gender in Dispute, in order to highlight its political potential, and the second section, “Performativity from language”, shows how performativity, which is particularly linked to the theory of Austin's speech acts, is linked to language as a political potential. The second chapter deals with Judith Butler's critiques of classical feminism and the conception of gender and how it is developing in the political realm. The third chapter focuses on the differences and articulations that exist between the proposal made by Butler in the two texts, focusing on the changes presented by her category of performativity and political coalition.